The Best of All Possible Obamas
Now and then I try to imagine what it would be like if I were wrong. I know — the very thought is absurd. But bear with me.
After all, it’s one of the contentions of us right-wingers that leftists, by monopolizing the news media, by framing every debate as an argument between their opinions and some sort of hatred, and by blacklisting the opposition from the entertainment business as well as academia, have put themselves in a position where they never have to defend their policies logically. By avoiding true discussion, they have given themselves a license to spout intellectual and political claptrap in loud, self-righteous voices. In the interests of wisdom, shouldn’t we refuse to do likewise but instead challenge ourselves to improve and hone our ideas in open disagreement? Of course not — it’s irritating. But now and then, I try to do it anyway.
So, for instance, though I’m a person of faith, I sometimes read works by atheists to insure that my ideas can withstand their attacks (easy-peezy). Likewise, now and then, I try to ask myself whether I haven’t gotten President Obama and the rest of the establishment left all wrong. Not everyone who voted for Obama, after all, was trying to save Big Bird’s right to an abortion or watching TV and thinking, “Gee, he hugged someone in New York. He’s nice.” Some of his supporters are actually intelligent people of good will who like what he’s up to. What do they see that I’m missing? Are we conservatives being too hard on the guy?
There’s no doubt that, on occasion, right-wing political discourse gets just as overheated as that of the left. Last week, for instance, Obama made some comment about “keeping my own naughty and nice list,” and some on the right made a fuss about how Nixonian and sinister it was. My feeling: It was a Santa Claus joke, dude — and perfectly fair bare-knuckle politics as usual. It ain’t bean bag. Chill.
So what if, just as a thought experiment, we eliminate ALL such hysterical stuff? What if we assume Obama is NOT some sort of Richard III “determin-ed to be a villain.” That he’s NOT trying to bring down the American economy? NOT intending to compromise our freedoms to appease Islamist savages? NOT attempting to leave America defenseless in the face of its enemies? What remains when we take all that away? Who is the best possible Obama?
Forward?
As far as I can tell, that best Obama — Obama as he sees himself — is pretty much in line with Charles Krauthammer’s version of the man. He’s a European leftist who wants, ala the leaders of post-World-War-II Britain, to trade our international power for a large social entitlements framework here at home. Is that so terrible? Winston Churchill, after all, supported universal health care. And Britain remained a reasonably free nation after exchanging its empire for the National Health Service. (Because that was the trade: the money that funded the European social model came out of Europe’s military budgets.) Through much of the second half of the last century, Europe was a charming place to live. I know — I lived there.
So okay, some of us may prefer living in America to New Europe, but would it really be so awful to have more social programs and fewer guns? Arms are for hugging, aren’t they? What’s the problem?
Well, of course, there is a problem and it’s a big one. Europe abandoned its international responsibilities after the war in the sure and certain knowledge that a rising U.S. was there to take them over. Without us, the Europeans would have been crushed by the Communist juggernaut. And Israel would just be one more of a thousand stories that end with the words “dead Jews.” Who does Obama think will step in when we have absconded militarily from the world scene in order to fund our entitlements? The UN? Even with us in the mix, the UN is still a festering snakepit of tyrants. Without a powerful American presence, it would soon be one big Global Jackboot. Who else then will defend world freedom? The Chinese? The Russians? The Muslim Brotherhood? Without US might, these chumps are power-hungry wolves outside a house of straw. As it was before the World Wars of the last century, the weakness of the good is the strength of evil.
And more. By my lights, a welfare state lasts for about seventy years then collapses. It takes a greedy generation like ours a single lifetime to spend both the wealth accumulated by its parents and that projected for its children. The Soviet Union hit that wall around 1990. Europe is hitting it now. We’re not far behind. Obama is not building a new American engine on the European model, he is hopping on the caboose of a train that has already crashed.
See, the truth is, Obama doesn’t have to be a villain to be a danger to our country and to the world. He is simply a visionary with his back to the future, leading us “forward” into a failed yesterday. He’s not evil. He’s reactionary. Which is why even the best of all possible Obamas is a complete disaster.
So it turns out I’m not wrong, after all. But of course we knew that.
Thanks, Andrew for putting all the pieces of the puzzle together in such a clear and intelligent manner. It’s the big picture that the liberal mind can never conceive or understand but your thoughts have brought it into clear focus. If they can’t understand it from this then their situation is hopeless.
Thanks Again,
B. Wilson
But since they’ve outvoted us once again, unfortunately, our situation seems hopeless, too.
My lefty friends will go over the cliff with O, and they won’t notice they’ve gone over until, like Wile E. Coyote, they look down. At that point they’ll blame the Republicans. And, unfortunately, the Republicans are almost as bad as the Dems and deserve much of the blame. Very sad to watch this train wreck unfold.
We are all watching this all in amusement.I love to see the lefties have a taste of their own medicine.Do they whinge do they scream!They are so stupid that they cannot believe that they too will be impacted.I love to see them twist and turn in the wind,serve them right no sympathy,and I relish every minute of it.
So the point of the article seems to be that Obama is not deliberately attempting to destroy the country and that therefore he is not evil. It is only his policies that will effectively destroy our country and way of life.
The fact that these are the very same policies which are currently destroying the European Union and many individual states therein, AT THE VERY SAME TIME, that Obama is inflicting them on us is not… I don’t know, suspicious to you? What is he a complete schmuck? Can anybody really be that big a fool and still rise to be a two term POTUS???
Face it man, he, and many of his followers, are malignant bags of grievance filled spiritual pus. Seriously so. “Hate whitey, hate Jews, hate America, hate history, hate men, hate whitey some more… wanna watch it all burn…” type of deepseated hatred. Jesus, watch a Batman movie or two.
Like you said he is a schmuck…as an exercise in the kind of thought experiment proposed above I would challenge anyway to show empirical proof that our President is not in fact a grossly ignorant possibly stupid individual(but cunning nonetheless; I assume it is kind of like antibiotic resistance development for bacterium. He was “cultured” in Chicago)
“Because that was the trade: the money that funded the European social model came out of Europe’s military budgets.”
Ah, but here’s the rub: Europe’s freedom was not without protection. Granted, they had decimated their military to the point of being about as dangerous as a bunch of boy scouts with butter knives at a Bloods and Crips gang fight, but they didn’t need their own military because they had the U.S. Military who could — and would — come in and save the day. After all, they did it in the 40′s, and before that in the late 10′s. So they had no concerns, because they had no doubts the U.S. Military would save their necks if push came to tactical weapons.
But now who will protect Europe when the U.S. Military is more concerned about if they are wearing the correct shade of pink in the “gay day” parade? And who will America depend on to protect it’s citizens and sovereignty when their enemies attack?
That’s part of the fun of disarmament. You never know who the next enemy that kicks your butt will be. Since Obama is running the FDR algorithm, this too is in the plan. Krugman should be happy at another rerun of WW2. Stimulus galore!
Sam, the plan is to completely leave the US in such disrepair, even a sorry assed opponent will be able to take on the heretofore leader of the free world.
While it is also the case that the Radical/Pyromaniac-in-Chief is a reactionary, the danger lies in that he is also a leftist revolutionary, with a dollop of Islamism too.
The point being, his main goal is to deconstruct and destroy the US into a third world basket case. And he will not be deterred until such a scenario plays out. At such time, the US will not need to be beaten, it will limp off on its own, into the dustbin of history.
And it is not as if civilizations don’t die. They do. So do empires.
And this is the ‘best’ of all Obama outcomes – http://adinakutnicki.com/2012/08/09/barack-hussein-obamas-brave-new-world-second-amendment-pro-life-supporters-bear-watchinglabeling-islamists-not-so-much-commentary-by-adina-kutnicki/
Chilling to the core.
You are spot on that it is about good versus evil. Conservative Christians and Jews understand that it is nonsensical to rationalize that Hitler was not such as bad guy after all, since the Germans had a rich culture, education and generally superior intelligence to the mopes in Eastern Europe and were much harder working and less decadent than the French; so of course he was just helping them by conquering Europe. The Jews were an obstacle and to make an omelet, one must break some eggs.
Likewise, the Crusaders were rude reactionaries to the Islamic outreach of the time since the Islamists were just following their religious beliefs, even if their version of morality meant Sharia Law that means enslaving and killing infidels, stoning gays and adulteresses, and blowing up Jews for not agreeing.
Socialism and Islamic terror does not respect one’s freedom, faith or property. But isn’t that just another life choice in Hell.
Im depending on Chinese Americans to be human shields when the Chinese saddle up. I think that is the plan, else why would we like the Canadians import these dual loyalists?
Will the Europeans re-up like the Japanese seem to be mustering the steam up to do?
Oh please spare us the ignorant uneducated American ‘we saved you all’ BS. In WW1 America joined the war begun in 1914 only in 1917 and did not begin to arrive in Europe in any great numbers until 1918 when it was just about all over. Google the casualty lists of the combatants and you will see just how true that is. Before that you sat on the fence getting RICH selling to BOTH sides.
It was the same story in WW2 America only joined the war begun in 1939 in 1941 when Japan attacked you and Germany declared war on YOU in support of its Japanese ally. Before that as in WW1 you sat on the fence getting richer selling to BOTH sides.
The UK and France won WW1 and Russia defeated Germany in WW2.The Wehrmacht in France were only a miniscule part of the Army that was decimated in Russia. But hey at least you were largely responsible for beating mighty Japan.
Oh and yes you did give aid to the UK in WW2 but it was ‘Lend Lease’ and the UK paid back every red cent in gold and territories.
Let us assume for the moment that everything you say is true. If I loan you $100 to buy groceries needed to keep your family from starving, have I not saved your family from starvation?
*Yawn*
Another European, incapable of accepting that Europeans simply cannot be trusted, intent on blaming all their ills on the US.
“..it was ‘Lend Lease’ and the UK paid back every red cent in gold and territories.”
You’re post is disingenuous at best. The US taxpayers still got jammed in the end even AFTER the deep discounts and low interest rates.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-American_loan
“There was no charge for the Lend Lease aid delivered during the war,… Congress had not authorized the gift of supplies after the war, so the administration charged for them, usually at a 90% discount. … In 1946, the post-war Anglo-American loan further indebted Britain to the U.S. Lend-lease items retained were sold to Britain at 10% of nominal value, giving an initial loan value of £1.075 billion for the Lend Lease portion of the post-war loans. Payment was to be stretched out over 50 annual payments, starting in 1951 and with five years of deferred payments, at 2% interest.[30] The final payment of $83.3 million (£42.5 million), due on 31 December 2006 (repayment having been deferred in the allowed five years), was made on 29 December 2006 (the last working day of the year). After this final payment Britain’s Economic Secretary to the Treasury, Ed Balls, formally thanked the U.S. for its wartime support.”
Still won’t keep the poms from moaning about their cherished fallicies.
A substantive reply would clearly be wasted on someone as ignorant and delusional as “Pragmatist.”
That’s the BS our schools have been teaching for the past 60-some years.
Notice that every reply so far is straining at the gnat of economic aid. Thanks to Woodrow Wilson, perhaps the most delusional president ever, we sat on our hands for 3 years. Patton used Renault tanks and we flew British and French aircraft because Wilson believed our neutrality prevented us from even preparing for the possibility of war. We got into the fighting for just the last 6 months of a 4-year war. US deaths were about 10% of those incurred by the British Empire or the French, and maybe 5% of Russia’s.
We did the same in WWII – let the Brits fight all of 1941 alone while we formed America First committees and debated neutrality. We changed only when Japan & Germany declared war on US. (And no, such things as Lend Lease, destroyers for bases, and the undeclared war on German submarines do not tip the scales in our favor any more than the guy in the corner with the sponge and bucket can claim to be a boxer.) FDR, an unmitigated disaster as an economist, at least had the foresight to get us ready for war (for which the pacifists, who didn’t learn from Wilson’s folly, accused him of conspiring to entangle us in the war.)
Patriotism is admirable. Knee-jerk jingoism is embarrassing. And if you don’t know the difference, odds are you arein the latter category.
Whose wars were those in Europe? We had little stake in either save resisting tyranny and evil. My dad fought in WWII, my uncle was on a torpedoed ship.
But hey let’s not quibble. When the Muslims come slit your throats we’ll pass on mustering the next generation of young Americans to send “over there”.
You are wrong in your military analysis.
1. In WWI the records show that the Brit & French generals were thrilled to have the American units join them. They wanteed to put the Americans undert their own ‘more experienced’ generals rather than continue with ‘colonial officers’. Pershing saw the tactics, tactics that had brought GB & F to the edge of defeat and declined a joint command under an ‘experienced’ general. Pershing saw the wasteful slaughter brought on by the horrible tactics of France and Britain and proceeded to use more modern, life valuing tactics. The result was a tunrnaround where the US/F/GB quickly reversed the german advantages and in a short time proceeded to win the war.
Suggesting that Americans did not win WI for F & GB is silly, counterfactual nonsense.
2. Regarding WWII; are you really arguing that german losses on the ‘russian front’ were going tol free France and forestall the squeezing of GB ?
Silly stuff.
Without the United States WWI and WWII would have ended with german expansion. This is undeniable.
If we hadn’t entered WW1 it’s likely there wouldn’t have been a WW2.
And most likely no Boshevik takeover of Russia either.
Pragmatists:
Those wars you say Europe “won” were also unnecessary wars that Europeans started. We Americans did indeed rescue you from your own folly. The introduction of Americans in the final year of WWI tipped the balance to Britain and France, period. In WWII the Soviets were able to beat back Germany with massive infusions of American equipment and materiel. America bestrode the world after WWII because it was not the stupid one who started the troubles that devastated the rest of the world, we just finished the job of final victory. It is a damned good thing that we were spared most of the ravages of war on our home front for your sake.
I really tire of Europeans thinking that we Americans are “ignorant.”
Don’t you always love the ‘Ignorant American’ assertion. So droll, so predictable, so sophmoric, so lacking in creative intellect. Hmmm, let’s see…America has produced the world’s largest economy since 1886 when we surpassed Great Britian. For most of the last 126 years we have outproduced our nearest competitor by a factor of 4, with inovation and savvy. So, if we’re ignorant, what does that make the Europeans…imbeciles, evidently. And ungrateful imbeciles at that. Tell you what…when the sharia boys begin mass decaptitations we’ll just sit back and watch. In the near future our European ‘cousins’ are going to discover that liberal ‘tolerance’ is a one way street. I wish them the best of luck with their new muzzy friends. Well, maybe France will rise to the occasion (yeah, right). God knows the Brits have no scrotums left.
Some boy scouts with butter knives for y’all
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Imjin_River
It is inarguable that GB and some Western European nations have maintained some very effective fighting units since WWII, but it is also inarguable that none of them have maintained enough of a military to be able to act unilaterally against a significant military force. The West Germans and the British together would hardly have amounted to a speed bump in the Fulda Gap. Without US forces the USSR could have had its tanks on the Pas de Calais in mere days, the time if would have take to drive them there. That said, WITH US forces they might have been able to do it fairly quickly unless the US used tactical nukes. It’s a good thing the Soviets were afraid of us in the ’60s and ’70s; they don’t know what an opportunity they missed.
….The West Germans and the British together would hardly have amounted to a speed bump in the Fulda Gap…
Full stop!…we Canadian’s (4CMBG) sat in defence of that gap for decades. Based on doctrine – ie. assuming they would attack in waves – we were kitted and prepared to hold the gap…even while you yanks were over-run on our flanks.
But could the Canadians do that now?
Hey but they got a heck of a human rights commission, ‘ey?
And we of 2ACR felt we could hold our own in the tri-zonal area given that we expected the main effort to take place northwest of us. I and my grandkids are quite happy that that remained a theoretical conundrum.
“And Israel would just be one more of a thousand stories that end with the words “dead Jews.””
You are a writer, sir, and a thinker, in a blogosphere with few of either.
So… it’s not back to the future, it’s back to a failed past. Got it. Currently a friend and I are trying to have an elevated discussion about abortion via email. We’ll see how he does stripped of the usual weapons of the left, ridicule and accusation. I’m not hopeful but… I’m hopeful enough to at least have the conversation. We are after all the salt of the Earth. Gotta shake the salt out of the shaker at times of opportunity to make the whole thing work.
I think he’s evil. That’s the vibe I get.
Me too!
Is Obama naive or are we naive? Are we to believe that he knew diddly squat about the Muslim Brotherhood before let Morsi seize the reins of power in Egypt? Sean Hannity predicted what would happen. I assess Obama’s decisions by this standard:what would a closet Muslim do?
Ignorant of the Muslim Brotherhood? Not with Huma Abedin as Hillary’s Deputy Chief of Staff. To say nothing of the fact that they had already been identified during Dubya’s tenure as being intimately linked with Hamas, which we had designated as an international terror organization.
No, the Mole-and-Thief knew full well.
Ya think?
Both on the pc left and the right, it’s forbidden to make the Obama/Hitler comparison. Everybody criticizes you. Nobody takes you seriously. Which is exactly what Obama is banking on, allowing him to imitate Hitler in so many ways without the threat of comparison.
But I just can’t bite my tongue anymore. Obama is Hitler with big ears.
He’s destined to end up in a bunker.
Full Mussolini would be my guess.
That too.
That’s a very intelligent piece.
But Europe also financed its healthcare with higher taxes, and it just doesn’t work well anymore. The average German goes to the doctors 16 times a year, I read, 16 times, imagine! Some might go to have a nice chat while waiting and to read the magazines for free. Some doctors even have coffee-machines, so you can have a great day there with free stuff, until finally the doctor explains to you that there is still no remedy against common cold. Basically it would be better if people, unless they are really sick, paid some of the medical care by themselves. People are always wiser with their own money than sombody else’s money, especially the money of the detested “rich”.
Then, concerning the military. When the Western military is reduced one should also reduce the export of weapons, otherwise one day the wrong parts of the world are armed brillantly and, because of lacking healthcare i.e. contraception and work have plenty of military personal. So, for Europe and above all, Israel, a lesser military presence of the United States is not at all desirable.
And one day when Iran has managed to build far reaching intercontinental rockets or when they might have turned Mexico into a proxy it’s not good for the US either.
So, you are right. Even when you subtract every single insinuation the president is on the wrong path like all ideologues btw.
Mr. Klavan’s arguments against the statist and collectivist tyranny now engulfing us and the world are weak, indeed, if they just boil down to the loss of American military might and simply avoiding a failed bureaucracy. Are there any intellectuals left among us who have a deeply held conviction that it is man’s God-given birthright to live in a world of freedom and liberty and can deliver that argument with alacrity and vigor? It is harder and harder to find such intellectuals today, it seems. Even among those of us on the right side.
The answer to your question is Yes, and Andrew Klavan is one of the best of them.
If Klavan is such an unabashed advocate for freedom and liberty, I sure didn’t see it reflected in his article. The only problem he has with statist tyranny is that it doesn’t allow unfettered expenditures on military systems but redirects that money into failed social policies such as healthcare, which is a weak argument to make against the growing tyranny of the welfare state. We need to develop a solid understanding of the principles of the Rights of Man and Natural Law that undergirds the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution that advocates for individual liberty and militates against collectivist slavery; particularly the slavery of good intentions (whether being the world’s policeman or social services provider) that is used to justify the evil of a monstrous Leviathan.
This isn’t Mr. Klaven’s only article. He’s written others. He’s also produced a video or two. You are familiar with his oeuvre , no?
Nor did he comment on the importance of flossing daily-hello?
Klavan’s bio states: “The thing about working in the mosh pit of politics is that it gets very easy to get angry at your opponents, very easy to get self-righteous, and very easy to start impugning the motives of everyone who disagrees. And that’s antithetical to my main profession, being an artist — a job that requires a certain amount of understanding and compassion for everyone. So while I’m as rock-ribbed a Constitutionalist as you’ll find, I try hard to remember that people of good will really do disagree.”
Great…So Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, and Hussein and the Marxocrats…Why, they’re just people of good will with whom we disagree. Yeah, it sux that Hussein and the Marxocrats always vote for unfettered abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, confiscation of private property, religious persecution (gay marriage), involuntary servitude (national healthcare), and are now responsible for bringing about the destruction of the 230 year old Constitutional Republic of old, but, hey, “Can’t we all just get along?”
I can’t imagine a more feckless and gutless approach to the problem of Marxocrat tyranny in our time; Particularly from someone who touts himself as a “rock-ribbed Constitutionalist”. I’ll say this, though; It’s easy to see why people say you can really spin a good yarn…
Write sommore,i was enjoying it!Can you recommend another europe somewhere where i can spend a fer years when the CHIT HITS THE FAN?
So right. We Americans should count our blessings.
Others to provide therapy to disturbed peoples blowing up their siblings, or creating prisons of their nations because mama/papa didn’t provide enough love and attention not now the problem for the peoples of the US of A.
We The People can sleep easy knowing benevolent Peoples are to guard us from one another when necessary. To create utopia of universal brotherhood and loving compassion via ultra competent and compassionate huminatarians in the United Nations and its members, e.g. China and/or Russia. How about Zimbabwe and Libya, members and former joint chiefs of the UN Human Rights Council?
Or perhaps nations that until the Guns of August were empires now a wannabee New Age Empire on the template of the United Nations. The dreamed of United States of Europe to counter that upstart US of A.
All in service to universal brotherhood, of course. But they too have other problems. American withdrawal from defense costs to police the family of nations means they’ll need their own wherewithal for defending their utopia.
Americans can finally spend the wherewithal earned via their economic and political principles, ingenuity, creativity, labours, time and generosity on themselves and their own needs for love and compassion.
Yes Dr. Obama-Pangloss and his colleagues Let There Be Light to show that all is for the best in this best of all possible worlds.
“a welfare state lasts for about seventy years then collapses”. Exactly. That Ponzi fellow was a piker.
“Europe was a charming place to live. I know — I lived there.”
Loads of expats still do. Mostly white men, so in the “Bland-New-America”, it isn’t a loss.
“The Soviet Union hit that wall around 1990. Europe is hitting it now. We’re not far behind.”
Yup. America will just do it bigger and faster as is our style. Did you catch this over the weekend?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2179243/US-birthrate-plummets-lowest-25-years.html
Less personal expendable income, and more given to the state, discourages people from having kids. European and even Russian populations shrink every year. Today in Japan, more diapers are sold for old people than for babies.
It’s going to get interesting.
There’s only one Western country I’m aware of with a healthy birthrate: Israel. Granted, much of that fertility is among the Arab (esp. Bedouin) and ultra-Orthodox communities, but even secular Israelis still believe in families.
Been awhile since I checked the data, but Ireland was the only country in the EU still having a healthy birth rate above +2 children, but they are only about 4.5 million people.
That Daily Mail article seems a little disingenuous, for it does not take into account the abortion rate over the last 25 years. I would posit that we are creating just as many babies as ever, we are just slaughtering them before they become old enough to count. Our right to convenience has resulted in our loss of an entire generation.
“Less personal expendable income, and more given to the state, discourages people from having kids”
Yes, but it only discourages CERTAIN PEOPLE from having kids-the responsible Makers-as they must must pay for everyone else’s first, before ever having something left over to spend on their own.
The Takers pop them out like rabbits.
And who do you think Obama and The Left need more of to stay in power?
I agree with you. I also see Obama as the man helping to speed the USA toward the same fate as the failing Europe. However, as an Israeli, I’m offended by your glib little line “And Israel would just be one more of a thousand stories that end with the words “dead Jews.”
It certainly helped us that America had our back, but we would have make it regardless, by our own blood, sweat and tears.
Well, you did indeed. There’s photos on the web of kibbutz trenches with teenage girls in shorts and sandals and steel helments, fighting off Arab tank attacks in 1948. It’s been a ceaseless David vs oil-rich Goliath ever since, and ever without an American soldier in the line. But author was taking poetic license, valid in terms of the nuclear umbrella up through Israel’s development of her own. USSR nuke rocket forces with no USA restraining them, could’ve been a disaster what with the soviet kow-tow to araby at the time.
Exactly, even in the Yom Kippur war US aid to Israel saved Egypt from finding out if Israel would nuke it. Indeed Israel is one of the few Middle East states that does not rely to a certain extent on US protection. Look at the Gulf States and Saudi Arabia. Iraq depended on the US to protect it from Iranian hegemony.
It is a much more dangerous world because of the dolts who voted on the basis of fashion and elected Obama.
Let it burn, baby.
Andrew, I am having a hard time reconciling your view of what Labour Socialism did to Europe with a country called “The Sick Man of Europe.” Claire Berlinski does a fine job in her bio of the Thatcher Years called ‘There is No Alternative’ of laying out precisely how sick Britain was. I was over there in 1980 and it was still a shocking comparison to the economic vibrancy of the US. Even just after Carter.
When you add on Obama’s plans for education, K-12 and higher ed, that are literally designed to tear down the rational, logical minds bestowed by the Enlightenement (at least on some) in favor of minds habituated to respond from emotion, you really have a mess building up. This is a President pushing false notions in classrooms because it is politically powerful. Have you ever looked into what “Facing History” is really all about?
So it is more than the decreptude of the welfare state. It’s more than an inability to afford to fund the military needed to keep the evildoers and despots in check. In fact the Belmont Challenge I wrote about here http://www.invisibleserfscollar.com/the-belmont-challenge-and-the-death-of-the-individual-via-education/ goes live via the Future Earth Alliance (with UNESCO among others operating in Sweden) next month. In 2013. We will then officially be what is called a Quality of Life/Ecosystem Society instead of a consumer-based economy where the individual has a zone of autonomy against interference. Except we are not supposed to know. I guess only grant recipients are supposed to read the Policy briefs from last March’s Planet under Pressure conference in London.
It all seems like Science Fiction or a bad futurist pulp novel but it is very real. We have way too many influential people now who seriously believe the right utopia has just not been tried. They are wrong but wrong ideas can still have devastating consequences.
You need to go back to Europe to live there again…it can still be a charming place to live. (I know, I live in France.) But the US cannot be Europe (and certainly not France). I think Obama knows all this. I think he would just like to see the US as caring more about its people and a little less about world domination. (PS. The world domination thing hasn’t been going too well, has it?)
Please excuse us Americans for not immediately appreciating your definition of “taking care.” There have been too many generations before us of self-reliant Americans. We are having a difficult time acclimating to your hot water bath of socialism. You who have been soaking for so long have forgotten what the brisk air of independence feels like.
BTW: I’m American. My father had his own business in the US (as did his father..same can be said on my mother’s side). I’ve worked in the States as a physician until I recently retired. The US doesn’t need to become Europe or France…but a little less aggressiveness internationally would be nice. There’s a lot to improve here at home. PS. My kids still live and work in the States.
“But the US cannot be Europe (and certainly not France)”
You, sir, are absolutely correct. The USA can never be “you”.
At least, not until a civilization 1000 times more robust than ourselves in Character, Discipline, Innovation,Perseverance, Endurance, Reliability, Charity and Morality springs up one day for US to mooch from, to fight our wars, and to receive unlimited financial aid from in the aftermath of our repeated failures.
When we Americans finally have THAT sort of “Big Brother” just fall from the sky into our lap, and soothe our conscience into believing that nothing is so easy than to leave all the trouble and details to “someone else”, THEN we can finally be as leisurely self-assured as YOU, about how wonderfully “superior” we are.
I didn’t take anything you wrote personally because I’m not French, I’m American. I spend plenty of time in the US and both my kids live here (I’m in the US right now) Anyway, I’m not saying the US should become like Europe or France…they have their own problems. I just think caring more about people here in the USA and less about controlling the world would be nice. This is a great country that can be better.
I think I understand your position a little better; however, when you speak of what the U.S. should be doing, many people will assume you are referring to the U.S. government, not the society at large. Should the U.S. care more about its people? Perhaps, through non-political institutions such as the Church. Personally, I could do with a little less of Obama-style caring. On second thought, a lot less.
Well let’s review how world domination has been going then.
- Hitler – 3rd Reich dissolved
- Stalin – Berlin Wall ripped down
- China – now more capitalist than the US
- Israel – a homeland after 2,000 years
- Warfare in general – at an all-time low
- world-wide Poverty and Hunger – at all-time lows
So yeh, I would say world domination has been going pretty well.
The world has the United States to thank.
(and ps: despite the chest-thumping by Islam about all of its “successes”, 99% of the millions of deaths that Islam is responsible for are Muslims. In the greater scheme of things, the US, unlike the idiots in Europe, are hardly affected by the barbarian psychopaths.)
(second ps: all comments are for pre-2009 America)
So all that changed after 2009? Still think the US can do better without looking for fights. Just my opinion. BTW: I’m American…just moved to France after my retirement. My kids still live in the US.
You’re all wrong.
First, the only way for a a government to take care of its people is to leave them alone so they can take care of themselves. Government can only ever deliver $1 of benefit by destroying $10 of resources. All it does is use other people’s money to buy votes. “Caring for people” is what foolish people are led to believe by the smiling faces that hypnotize them.
Second, if the USA were interested in world domination, the entire world would be a huge US territory by now, with the possible exception of some smoldering wastelands here and there. The USA foreign policy has always been about frustrating all the other (mostly European) imperialist powers. Europeans just can’t stomach the notion that their imperial ambitions and fascination with fascism led to their own downfall, and so they lash out at the only country that gives a hoot about them. Of course they lash out at us: being cowards, they lash out only at the countries they know will not harm them. RIghteous indignation is the primary defense mechanism of the depraved and the guilty.
“I think Obama knows all this.”
Thats generous. He displays little in what many would call a thinking man.
“I think he would just like to see the US as caring more about its people and a little less about world domination. (PS. The world domination thing hasn’t been going too well, has it?)”
False concern and a slur to cap it. Cute, but false.
The American ‘Financial and Military Empire’ created after WW2 with all the ill gotten gains the US made selling to BOTH sides in the two World Wars is proving to be the shortest lasting world empire on record. A “Banana Empire ‘ if you like.
First, I take issue with your phrase “ill-gotten.” Second, I do not agree with your interpretation of history (it smells of liberal revisionism), but am interested to know what alternative policy the U.S. ought to have adopted in your opinion. Remember, in those days, we were not ruled by an oligarchic machine able to enact any course of action at will; the political choices and decisions of that day had to reflect the will of the people. But, nevertheless, please enlighten us.
And “Pragmatist” exposes himself as a bigot.
And a fascist. And a scumbag. And a liar. And a coward. And a…..
The list goes on.
A little evidence for WW II sales to both sides? You are going to have to stretch a ways back from the advent of the war to make that case, but go for it. Also, explain why the most radical commenters give themselves names that are the opposite of what they espouse? The leftist way I guess.
You can’t conflate the two world wars.
WW1 did not have clearly defined “good guys” and “bad guys”. The USA was neutral through much of that war, and as such was legally permitted to do business with both sides. However, American merchant ships did not attempt to run the British blockade, so no commerce of any consequence was transacted with Germany. It took that “progressive” moron Woodrow Wilson to gin-up anti-German sentiment and get us into that war (introducing totalitarianism to the USA in the process, and wrecking the Constitution in order to pave the way for all subsequent “progressive” subversion). American entry in WW1 probably did not have much lasting impact. As bad as the Versailles Treaty was, it would have been even worse without Wilson. On the other hand, under the enlightened management of Herbert Hoover, who administered the war-relief effort in Europe, the USA saved Europe from a mass starvation that could have rivaled the Black Death in its effects.
As for WW2, you can’t say we did business with both sides, unless you count “delivering” thousands of tons of bombs on German cities from 20,000 feet as “doing business”.
America never had an “empire”, except in a trivial sense immediately after the Spanish-American War (Philippines and Cuba), of which it divested itself as fast as it could feel safe that another imperial power would not replace it.
Deep down I think Europeans are upset because they know the USA has made them look like chumps, and that is why they love Obama: they KNEW that he would wreck America. Their love for Obama is an expression of ANTI-Americanism. Likewise, the people who voted for Obama here are mostly those Americans who have been taught by our depraved school system to hate their own country.
–love your comment, but Wilson walked out of the treaty conference –he became annoyed with the British and French positions and negotiating styles, and threw his cards on the floor and went home. Those cards, later, were picked up by the janitor, Herr Schicklegruber, a dead ringer for Charlie Chaplin.
I agree with everything except the suggestion that our school system is responsible for Obama. I attribute his election to the belief that a young man is more fashionable than an old man. For a generation who never had to worry about war or deprivation the trivial concerns become important, hence Obama. In short, it was more fashionable to vote for Obama. He is the President of the in-crowd, Hollywood and Manhattan wanna-bes.
That reference to Europe in the first line should say the UK instead. Typing with a cold is dangerous.
When I reread that Belmont Challenge post I recognized that the modelling of “interaction between humans and the weather-climate-biogeochemical system” I was quoting from the actual report dovetails perfectly with an EPA report put out last week on its new Mission. Called “The Road Ahead” it adopts systems thinking political theories to formulate models about the future to create regulations to be imposed now. Supposedly for the public health.
So we are hurtling towards the kind of economic planning that the Kremlin only dreamed of under the delusion that this time it will work because we have bigger computers and Big Data. Plus education devoted to creating new moral values around a mandated Universal Love Principle.
No I am not kidding. Then of course the same profs with the moral devt theories sign petitions that distributive justice is not enough.
Bumpy ride ahead. Buckle up.
Fine analysis. What is surprising to me is that he seems to be, as Klavan describes him, ‘. . . simply a visionary with his back to the future, leading us “forward” into a failed yesterday.’ A perfect formulation. But did this man and the party he leads miss the second half of the 20th century? You don’t haved to be a devotee of Hayek to know that the grand ‘Socialist’ experiment failed and failed miserably. Remember? The Cold War? The collapse of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe and the human misery they represented? It wasn’t that long ago. Where were these guys? How did they miss it?
That was the dry beach before the tsunami. The USSR was toast about 1954. It just kept on going because the US got a case not being able to find a way to bring them down. Reagan’s vision was the reason they went under. But “he who fights the dragon becomes the dragon”. Reagan forgot to clean up the universities and colleges (a herculean task!) Think about it. Where was B.O. in 1992 along with all the idiots that call themselves Socialists and Communists today? But the final battle is approaching and we read the book… we know we win in the end. The parasites are simply enjoying their little moment in the sun right now. Their unsustainable way of life will end just like the USSR ended: a pitiful bunch of half starved alcoholics devastated by abortion and their own wickedness towards each other. There will be evil for a little while more but then it will end not with a bang but with the kind of crunchy sound that one hears when stepping hard on a cockroach.
How did they miss it?
They didn’t. But they also trot out all the standard progressive excuses;
And then they trot out their justification for doing it again;
Ideologues cherish dogmas. And their response to reality tends to consist of ignoring it if it clashes with those dogmas.
If you’re the messenger, you risk being shot into the bargain. Because in their minds, anyone who tells them something they don’t want to hear is the enemy.
And they “know how to deal with” people like that.
clear ether
eon
There is a difference between European leftists and American leftists. Western Europeans adopted socialist ideas willingly, their political class did not have to resort to Orwellian tactics to brainwash the citizenry. The American left, personified today by Obama, had to overturn American political tradition with the “long march” through American institutions. Their political instincts, tactics, and traditions are based on deception and dishonesty. They may discover some day that they can’t even trust each other.
While I believe that Europe and America are both sliding down hill, they are on different paths. Twenty years from now we may wish we had slid down the same path as Europe.
Excellent point!
“…I sometimes read works by atheists to insure that my ideas can withstand their attacks (easy-peezy).”
That is flat out lame Mr. Klavan. You know that not all atheists wish to “attack” you, as implied. In fact, many just want to be left alone to live their lives as they see fit, much as you would want. In fact, atheists write many books that never touch on the subject of belief. As do believers. Are all those other ideas ok?
Yes, this piece is tongue in cheek. When it comes to non conforming “cosmic” thoughts, it seems that the tongue sometimes strays where the other cheeks live.
Tongue in cheek…?
Are you really so stupid that you don’t understand that he’s referring to “atheist philosophy”-type books, and not cookbooks?
No, this is an established pattern by Klavan, of using atheists as whipping boys.
There’s has not been a positive comment on Klavan’s part about atheists to best of my knowledge. Using the book line is just an example, not a through presentation of the ill will. We’re using different criteria here. Klavan’s statement could be see to include any conversation.
Klavan does what many do and most of us at some point do. That is, speak from an emotional point of view about something he has a strong dislike for, and using that in a wider application. Then without refuting it when he is called on it, to the best of my knowledge
Klavan writes what he wishes, and some criticism is valid. It comes with the territory, he knows that.
Having said that, I quite enjoy Klavan’s pieces, and agree with him for the most part.
Very good comments, Mr. Lucky. I feel Klavan’s subtle and not so subtle pin-pricks toward non-believers in most of his pieces. It’s kinda his thing. Klavan mistakenly believes believers have a corner on the morality market, and it diminishes his standing as an original thinker.
Like you, I’m still a fan, though, for his wit and often fresh perspective. Just wish he would try to understand those of us who live rational, moral and, therefore, nonbelieving lives.
The ‘therefore’ confirms the proposition, and destroys the rebuttal in which it appears.
Nice logic lesson. Thanks!
Now where is such keen logic when arguing the concept of God with no evidence? It’s your posit, you must prove it. That’s logic.
Point is, morality is reality & logic based.
I’ve had plenty of experiences that support my belief in God. You want external but that’s not how it works most of the time. (But, the creation of the universe doesn’t make much sense without a Creator.) Since most people who believe in God have had encounters of one kind or another with the Almighty, you kind of need to accept the possibility that you’re missing an ability to recognize the evidence around you. Christ described it as “blindness” but sometimes it seems to resemble the sense of smell more; it’s usually that subtle.
no.
He’s evil. Look at his background, his mentors and his friends.
More evil than anybody can imagine.
Grinning like a jackass doesn’t make it any different. Hitler could be charming and he certainly didn’t think of himself as an evil person. In his mind, he was “transforming” the planet.
I agree. Obama’s games with the fiscal cliff go beyond mere politics. The US never had a President like him. The people do not know what they are up against, indeed most don’t know they are up against anything.
The only thing he can really do is play dirty politics.
I suggest that Obama is simply a person who spent their entire lives being spoon fed a particular viewpoint of the world (British empire evil, US hegemony evil, anyone on the right end of politics is evil, blacks are owed something for past evils, US military is a force of evil oppression, capitalism is evil, Israel is evil, socialism is good, government control of society is good, etc.) and is in a position to act upon it.
His competence extends only to the ability to get elected – which necessitates his use of shady financial contributions and shadow organizations and spectacular luck in having singularly incompetent opponents. Unfortunately, because he is competent at winning elections he also thinks he’s competent to run the country and every miniscule act within it.
Toss in a healthy dose of economic ignorance and hypocrisy, and you have a perfect blend called Obama.
It’s a bitter brew.
Bingo. Well put.
cheers
eon
Krathammer maintains that (although Isam is the “immediate challenge”), China will be the “challenge of this century.” (Quote from an interview with Ezra Levant’s The Source, on Sun tv). The Chinee are already flexing their muscles (attempting to eject the U.S. from their shores, changing maps on their passports, etc). China’s human rights atrocities are horrendous (including organ sales from prisoners, bulldozing over protesters, etc) — yet, with Obama and his goal of weakening the U.S., there will be no one to hinder China. A scary future awaits.
the challenge of this century is sitting in the white house with 54 Christmas Trees and an emperor’s treasure chest of luxury paid for by people who have actually worked in their lives, and the ability and desire to punish anybody who disagrees with the constant inanities that pour out of his mouth.
Not to worry, once our economy tanks theirs will too. Also their population is growing older, they have built cities no one can afford to live in, and their leadership consists of billionaires who never ran companies. Watch for an interesting next generation in China.
‘Toon of the Day: A Teenager is the Leader of the Free World
http://predicthistunpredictpast.blogspot.com/2012/12/toon-of-day-teenager-is-leader-of-free.html
By my lights, a welfare state lasts for about seventy years then collapses. It takes a greedy generation like ours a single lifetime to spend both the wealth accumulated by its parents and that projected for its children. The Soviet Union hit that wall around 1990. Europe is hitting it now. We’re not far behind. Obama is not building a new American engine on the European model, he is hopping on the caboose of a train that has already crashed.
That’s really very good.
But it’s also how it’s getting done, dismantling the mechanisms that made us great. It’s not just spending until the bank account is empty, it’s burning down the house and crops, too. And worse.
Even at best.
Andrew, I can’t help but feel that you’re being a bit too nice here in your efforts to show equanimity to the left.
At the very least Barack is a radical, who may be a puppet, but regardless he is the pawn of some very bad people who are intent on enslaving us. I think that Goldman’s piece on Obama needs to be immortalized (link below) and read periodically to remind us of who this guy is
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page/JB26Aa01.html
as it prophetically warned of the consequences that would result when he became president before he was ever elected. His record, his assault on freedom, his entourage of cronies and the low class manner in which he debated and attacked Romney also betrays him as an empty power-seeker; an amateurish, petulent, narcissistic power-seeker, submissively licking the hand of the elites who ensure he stays in office. He’s just the next person in line to be the distracting face of the real conspiracy.
Although I agree with the premise of what you are saying, Andrew, I do think that we will be unable to maintain our military at its current levels or maintain military treaty obligations no matter what happens. We are overextended and the military/industrial complex is almost as great a threat to our future as the entitlement state. It dragged us into Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as Libya. I do not discount their ability to drag us into another war if we go over the cliff and they see cuts in their budgets.
Obama is currently having a high ole time screwing the country over. But methinks he’s about to overplay his hand. He might believe that he was reelected with a mandate, but hubris has a way of showing up when megalomaniacs least expect it.
O believes that he has pushed the Republicans to the brink of disaster with his game of Fiscal Cliff Chicken. If he has why doesn’t he sit back and let them self-destruct? Instead, he has administration minions and media flunkies put pressure on Republican lawmakers to fold. Where’s the world-straddling confidence in that?
O proves that you can go a long way in American politics by putting the fear of racism in the other. I hope a majority wises up to this fraud in time for the Mid-terms.
–that may be too late. Look at the cat-who-swallowed-the-canary expression he and his henchmen are wearing theses days. Triumphant, is what they are feeling. Something needs to break the timetable –they know about the midterms. The vote-stealing will be calculated to display this time, Lavrenti Beria style: ‘it matters not that the people know we are causing their misery, when only we can stop it, the people will come to us and beg to join’ –is i guess an honest characterization, if not the quote itself.
Nah, we probably need a “Bonus March” of the whole nation, to have any chance of a great many of us finishing our natural life spans.
OK, Klavan – so you’re right – this time!
It’s true that the contentiously short-sighted, reactionary liberals are only concerned with the adversarial, painful fear of being proven wrong, not with the collaborative hope of being proven right.
So, having no facts, (nor any need for them) they simply use all the evasive tactics collectivley known as the critical-thinking logical fallacies – they slander the messenger, deflect and distract with red-herrings and the immorally relativistic argumentum tu quoque.
It’s all form over substance with them; I don’t think we can honestly call what they post as ‘thinking’ at all – it’s more like they only react with some sort of repetitive evasion program.
And, since they react to fearing fear in stead of the mistakes which cause the pain which they fear, they are far more prone to shoooting the messengers than are those on the more rational right.
Conservatives tend to respectfully fear change (“if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!”) while moslems and leftists see it as inevitable (“if we don’t rush in first, some other fools might beat us to it!”).
Thus liberals are the real “reactionaries,” and Conservatives are the real “progressives.”
Or maybe he’s just another opportunistic, power-hungry politician with no particular principles, who happened along at the right time (for him). James Madison and the rest of the founding fathers seemed to anticipate that this sort would appear all too often, and set up our system to survive them. We’ll survive this one also.
Will we survive the dolts who elected him? The means of controlling the masses are greater than ever. I fear becoming a lackey of a smothering, benevolent state, denying me the right to fail on my own.
The best possible Obama would be removed from office in disgrace and jailed for his crimes against the United States.
Who will save us? We will. Don’t forget we have guns, and for the most part, are not afraid to use them. What is left of the military will step up. Have faith, people”! We are not done. I will go down fighting. My freedom and my son’s freedom is too precious to just give up on.
Dead Jews? Without American pressure Israel would still be in possession of the Sinai desert and missile attacks on Tel Aviv would have been unheard off because we would vaporize the motherfuckers.
Don’t you think you should wait another three thousand years –you know, give us time to figure out what ‘kill or be killed’ means?
David Wall, i can’t find a reply button so have to respond to your question here: i’d say, you can’t have faith in no-faith –because that’s to have faith. You can say different, but only in the dialectic –words as the reality (JFK said “perception is reality”, then reality blew his mind of perception, and to this day ‘words fail’ the reality of it).
You don’t take your road test for your driver’s license by driving the Indy 500. Forget about the invisible superman in the sky –go with the faith you have now, it’s faith there is an absolute somewhere, and that’s gotta be, by God, a start.
LET’S BE HONEST AND CALL THE MODERN DEMOCRAT PARTY THE SOCIALIST PARTY. We need to start being honest and have the modern day Democrat Party relabeled and call it the Social Democrat Party. There is no shame in doing so and those that have supported the party because it has a “D” next to it need not feel shame in doing so either. The Old Democrat Party has been … READ MORE: http://bwcentral.org/2012/12/lets-be-honest-and-call-the-modern-democrat-party-the-socialist-party/
As for all the talk about European social democracies being “wonderful places to live” I beg to differ. I’ve been to Eurpoe many times and would never want to live there. I don’t want to pay $8 gal for gasoline, I’m unwilling to be disarmed, I want to be able to buy better medical care for my children instead of paying for it to be dispensed as leviathan sees fit, I’d rather drive my own car than take public transportation, etc.
The real problem is that there are dozens of countries an American liberal can emigrate to, but there is nowhere for the American conservative to flee to escape the descent into socialism. I think that deep down that’s one of the things that drives them. They don’t want anyone, anywhere in the world, to be able to escape the clutches and power of them and their ilk.
“The real problem is that there are dozens of countries an American liberal can emigrate to, but there is nowhere for the American conservative to flee to escape the descent into socialism. I think that deep down that’s one of the things that drives them. They don’t want anyone, anywhere in the world, to be able to escape the clutches and power of them and their ilk.”
Incisive comment. I would also add there is nowhere for fiscal conservatives to go either, as finding a responsible government that doesn’t tax to death is becoming pretty difficult. Maybe South Korea?